Paintings and Illustrations

I love these eclectic images from the Toronto artist Jon Todd. This first one in particular reminds me of a print Robbie owns of a beautiful Indian woman, bare-breasted, with her sari framing her face the way the iconic halo is framing this woman’s head.

I’ve always loved art with rich colors, and I especially appreciate the mosaic effect in a lot of Todd’s work. In his “Snake Handler,” for instance, the woman’s entire eye and eyelid are covered in a grid of color, like her neck and the neck of the woman above. (I also find the corset more than a little appealing.) You can clearly see Mexican, Russian, and Japanese accents in the art, as well as the influence of tattoo artists.

Turns out Todd sells geisha t-shirts and other gear, although all but his extra-small geisha hoodies are sold out at the moment. I hope that means he–and be-geisha’d goth girls–are having good times right now.

I couldn’t resist posting this (to me) hilarious snippet from ranat’s blog, beyond the hills. I think it perfectly captures the hall-of-mirrors transformations that can happen when you open yourself up to The World of Kink.

Her post starts with the realization that she’s has an internal vision of this certain man her whole life, and that the man is herself:

This blog began with that I’m dominant. I could finally admit that. And then that I’m a sadist. It was okay to say that too. Okay, then it became apparent I’m not straight. Oh, and by the way there is a man lurking in my head and he is me. What is this, fucking dominoes? Tip over one and eventually the rest will all fall down? I cannot even comprehend the artistry and subtlety of my self-repression to have so blithely hidden this all from myself for two decades.

I know what she means. On the other hand, sometimes I really, really like it when the dominoes fall.

The other night Robbie emailed me to tell me that for my next visit, I should plan to bring–sorry, I was required to bring–white cotton schoolgirl panties and hair ribbons. (“Colors (in priority in case they cost too much to buy all at once): pink, white, red, black and green.” He is nothing if not precise.)

The requirement that I provide things for Robbie’s increasing interest in costumes (one that I share) was super-hot to me. The prospect of trying to find ribbons in my new and urban environment, on the other hand, was surprisingly daunting and inspired a fit of hysteria out of all proportion to the task. (As I’ve noted before, tasks, no matter how small they are, really don’t seem to work well for us at distance; I go into insta-meltdown, and he ends up wondering why something intended to be sexy and fun turns into emotional crisis.)

I still don’t know where I’ll get the ribbon, since I’m thinking that the corner Starbucks and 24-hour CVS, my go-to sources for all that is essential, won’t be of use. But I’m determined to try to find something for whatever nefarious purposes Robbie has in mind. I have every intention of being the most irresistible schoolgirl he’s seen in some time. And I’m hoping if I’m good enough, he might even use a few of the ribbons elsewhere on me (wrists, ankles . . . ).

Robbie owns five acres of stunning farmland, a fact I don’t think I’ve mentioned here before. His land is so beautiful he often jokes that I’m in the relationship for his property rather than for him. The joke is funny because we both know it’s a litte too close to the truth. The first night I met him, he took my hand and led me out to show me the back fields, and the night sky above them, and wrapped me in his arms while I sighed happily. “Feels like home, doesn’t it?” he murmured into my ear. “It does,” I nodded.

It still does, now more than ever. He and I have plowed and planted here, buried and raised pets, kissed in virtually every corner. I’ve written so little this visit because we’re in the midst of laying out a garden that is 2800 sq. feet, or maybe 2900–I forget, or he recalculates. In fact, there has not been a whole lot of time and energy for things besides eating, working, eating, and sleeping. (Especially since I sleep 11 hours a day when given the opportunity.)

Nonetheless, Robbie has done more than his share to facilitate fun in the midst of farming. A couple of days ago, he had me string a trellis for the 6″ snow peas and snap peas that are eager to climb something, anything. I wove and tied binder twine (or is it baling twine?) in a zig-zag pattern between two horizontal pieces of clothes-line. The plan is that at the end of the summer, we can throw pea vines and binder twine directly into the compost bin.

Robbie had to teach me a few knots in order for me to make the trellis: a square knot, to tie pieces of twine together, an overhand knot, so that I could tie the twine to the wire, and a half-hitch, so I could secure the overhand knot. Well, he didn’t so much as teach me the knots as teach me the names for them, and make me aware that motions I’d been making rather randomly all my life were distinct and distinguishable. A half a day spent tying scratchy fibers definitely got my bondage juices flowing, though, and Robbie is more than attuned enough to me to take advantage of any and all juices he notices.

Later that afternoon, I took a shower and asked if there was anything more to do. He said he had a particular task for me that might give me an idea of what my long-term farming “duties” might be like if I were around the place more often. It turned out that this involved wearing a chest harness while I raked up a few grass cuttings from the front lawn and put them around some plants as mulch. When I’d done that comfortably, Robbie tightened the ropes and gave me another job to do–possibly the difficult task of taking a nap. (After three years, he is getting accustomed to my habits.) And after one more readjustment of the ropes, I got to set the table, make a salad for dinner, and sit down with him for a bit before my ropes came off.

I love rope almost as much as I love Robbie and his farm–in honesty, it is sometimes difficult o say which holds pride of place in my heart. I was thinking about rope today, and about this post, and about how if I wrote it, I might be able to explain how deep and primal my love for rope is. I thought about two 7-week-old kittens we have on the farm, and how, the other day, their mother plopped herself down in front of us and started to nurse them. While the kittens pawed and kneaded her belly, the mother cat’s eyes were almost shut from pleasure. A steady purr rose from the entire group. Bondage is like that for me–a comforting presence, a steady pull that makes me feel loved and wanted, content and happy. And luckily for me, the ties that bind me aren’t just literal.

Sometimes, I think I am getting almost defiantly used to being broken up with Robbie. A few months ago, while broken up, I took a literal (and yes, petty) step in moving on. I changed the passwords to this blog, my fetlife profile, and my yahoo email account, altering it from the password we created together to one that I made for myself. I changed the locks, literally and figuratively.

The only problem is that I hate the new password. I came up with it on a day I was feeling particularly low and self-loathing (probably around the time I was chain-eating donuts) and when I type it now, I feel correspondingly glum. I loved the last password, and so I guess it’s back to the drawing board.

And speaking of drawings and locks and playin’ around . . . I give you a selection of the inventive designs of Fernando Vicente . . .

My emotions are brats. I want, want, want. The other day I thought about the fact that, although I am not an only child, my sister is far younger than I. I was an “only” for almost seven years. And I am as stubborn and selfish sometimes as any only–with the arrogance of an older sister, to boot.

Tonight I called Robbie and told him I don’t WANT things to be like this. He laughed. I kept asking him to tell me why he was laughing, but he wouldn’t. I knew anyway. He always laughs at me after he’s broken up with me and I call and ask him if we can see each other again, be together again. Partly he’s laughing at me, partly at himself, partly at the absurdity of our relationship, and partly, he’s laughing from nerves. At least, that’s my conclusion.

We might see each other this weekend. We are idiots. Once, years ago, when I got back together with a boyfriend who had dumped me in a particularly inconsiderate way, he reported to me the words of a female friend of his on hearing the news of our re-coupling: “That’s idiotic. You’re an idiot, she’s an idiot, it’ll never work.”

My friends these days similarly think that both R. and I are idiots. I’ve given up trying to convince anyone of anything different. I figure that it’s not my problem if they find us annoying. They’ll eventually stop asking me about my love life, if it’s irksome to them.

On the other hand, single men will probably always ask me about my love life–not because I’m so luscious, because that is what single men do. The other day I changed my relationship status on FetLife. (Oh! The drama!) I didn’t do it entirely because of the breakup; long before the breakup, R. had been suggesting I remove the “in a relationship” tag because, he said, that was our business–and because I’d probably get more interest from folks if I didn’t advertise my unavailability.

Sure enough, he was right. Within an hour after I became newly, Fetishistically single, I got a message that read something like this:

DirtyOldMan: Do you enjoy bare-bottomed over-the-knee spankings? Shall we chat about our interests?

Me: No, thank you.

DirtyOldMan: You don’t enjoy bare-bottomed over-the-knee-spankings? Or we shan’t chat about our interests?

His message served precisely one purpose. It reminded me of the single OTK, bare-assed spanking I’d gotten from R. Setting to one side the nagging worries I had to contend with about crushing my boyfriend’s lap, that spanking was heavenly. I pouted after getting DirtyOldMan’s message, feeling once more like I don’t want to do kink with anyone but R. I want to be HIS schoolgirl.

Perhaps I’ll get the chance this weekend to be, fully, the willful, petulant, stubborn little creature that I feel kicking at the floors inside my heart. Perhaps I’ll even get corrected for it. A girl can dream, can’t she?